Sensational dinosaur blood report!

Actual red blood cells in fossil bones from a Tyrannosaurus rex? With traces
of the blood protein hemoglobin (which makes blood red and carries oxygen)? It sounds
preposterous—to those who believe that these dinosaur remains are at least
65 million years old.

It is of course much less of a surprise to those who believe Genesis, in which case
dinosaur remains are at most only a few thousand years old.

In a recent article,1 scientists from
Montana State University, seemingly struggling to allow professional caution to
restrain their obvious excitement at the findings, report on the evidence which
seems to strongly suggest that traces of real blood from a T. rex have
actually been found.

M. H. Schweitzer

These photos are of a later (2005) find by Schweitzer which produced soft tissue,
in addition to strengthening the red blood cell identification—see Still Soft and
StretchyLeft: The flexible branching structures in the T. rex
bone were justifiably identified as “blood vessels”. Soft tissues like
blood vessels should not be there if the bones were 65 million years old.Right: These microscopic structures were able to be squeezed out
of some of the blood vessels, and can be seen to “look like cells” as
the researchers said. So once again there is scope for Dr Schweitzer to ask the
same question, “How could these cells last for 65 million years?”

The story starts with a beautifully preserved T. rex
skeleton unearthed in the United States in 1990. When the bones were brought to
the Montana State University’s lab, it was noticed that ‘some parts
deep inside the long bone of the leg had not completely fossilized.’ To find
unfossilized dinosaur bone is already an indication more consistent with a young
age for the fossils (see More on fresh dino bone, below).

Let Mary Schweitzer, the scientist most involved with this find, take up the story
of when her co-workers took turns looking through a microscope at a thin section
of this T. rex bone, complete with blood vessel channels.

‘The lab filled with murmurs of amazement, for I had focused on something
inside the vessels that none of us had ever noticed before: tiny round objects,
translucent red with a dark center. Then a colleague took one look at them and shouted,
“You’ve got red blood cells. You’ve got red blood cells!”’2

Schweitzer confronted her boss, famous paleontologist ‘Dinosaur’ Jack
Horner, with her doubts about how these could really be blood cells. Horner suggested
she try to prove they were not red blood cells, and she says, ‘So far, we
haven’t been able to.’

Looking for dinosaur DNA in such a specimen was obviously tempting. However, fragments
of DNA can be found almost everywhere—from fungi, bacteria, human fingerprints—and
so it is hard to be sure that one has DNA from the specimen. The Montana team did
find, along with DNA from fungi, insects and bacteria, unidentifiable DNA sequences,
but could not say that these could not have been jumbled sequences from present-day
organisms. However, the same problem would not be there for hemoglobin, the protein
which makes blood red and carries oxygen, so they looked for this substance in the
fossil bone.

More on fresh dino bone …

To claim that bone could remain intact for millions of years without being fossilized
(mineralized) stretches credibility. The report here of red blood cells in an unfossilized
section of dinosaur bone is not the first time such bone has been found.

The evidence that hemoglobin has indeed survived in this dinosaur bone (which casts
immense doubt upon the ‘millions of years’ idea) is, to date, as follows:

The tissue was coloured reddish brown, the colour of hemoglobin, as was liquid extracted
from the dinosaur tissue.

Hemoglobin contains heme units. Chemical signatures unique to heme were found in
the specimens when certain wavelengths of laser light were applied.

Because it contains iron, heme reacts to magnetic fields differently from other
proteins—extracts from this specimen reacted in the same way as modem heme
compounds.

To ensure that the samples had not been contaminated with certain bacteria which
have heme (but never the protein hemoglobin), extracts of the dinosaur fossil were
injected over several weeks into rats. If there was even a minute amount of hemoglobin
present in the T. Rex sample, the rats’ immune system should build
up detectable antibodies against this compound. This is exactly what happened in
carefully controlled experiments.

Evidence of hemoglobin, and the still-recognizable shapes of red blood cells, in
unfossilized dinosaur bone is powerful testimony against the whole idea of dinosaurs
living millions of years ago. It speaks volumes for the Bible’s account of
a recent creation.